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Books of Chilin Bilam, 



The Prophetic and Historic Records 
of the Mayas of Yucatan. 

By DANIEL G. BRLNTON, \l. D. 



VICE-PRESIDENT OF TI!£ NUNflSMATIC AND ANTIQUARIAL SOCIETY OF 

PHILADELPHIA; MEMBER OF THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPIMCAL 

SOCIETY; THE AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY; 

DELEGUE OF THE INSTITUTION 

ETHNOGKAPHIQUE , 

ETC., ETC. 




EDWARD STERN & CO., 
PHILADELPHU. 




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PREFATORY NOTE. 



The substance of the present pamphlet was presented as an 
address to the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia, 
at its meeting in January, 1882, and was printed in the Penn 
Monthly, March, 1882. As the subject is one quite new in the 
field of American archaeology and linguistics, it is believed that a 
republication in the present form will be welcomed by students of 
these branches. 



THE BOOKS OF CHILAN BALAM * 

CIVILIZATION in ancient America rose to its highest level 
among the Mayas of Yucatan. Not to speak of the archi- 
tectural monuments which still remain to attest this, we have the 
evidence of the earliest missionaries to the fact that they alone, of 
all the natives of the New World, possessed a literature written in 
" letters and characters," preserved in volumes neatly bound, the 
paper manufactured from the bark of a tree and sized with a durable 
white varnish. f 

A few of these books still remain, preserved to us by accident 
in the great European libraries ; but most of them were destroyed 
by the monks. Their contents were found to relate chiefly to the 
pagan ritual, to traditions of the heathen times, to astrological 
superstitions, and the like. Hence, they were considered deleterious, 
and were burned wherever discovered. 

This annihilation of their sacred books affected the natives most 
keenly, as we are pointedly informed by Bishop Landa, himself one 
of the most ruthless of Vandals in this respect.J But already 

* Read before the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia, at its 
twenty-fourth annual meeting, January 5th, 1882. 

f Of the numerous authorities which could be quoted on this point, I shall give the 
words of but one, Father Alonso Ponce, the Pope's Commissary-General, who travelled 
through Yucatan in 1586, when many natives were still living who had been born before 
the Conquest (1541). Father Ponce had travelled through Mexico, and, of course, had 
learned about the Aztec picture-writing, which he distinctly contrasts with the writing ot 
the Mayas. Of the latter, he says : " Son alabados de tres cosas entre iodos los demas 
de la Nueva Espaiia, la itna de que en su antiguedad tenian caracteres y letras, con 
que escribian sus historias y las ceremonias y orden de los sacrificios de sus idolos y su 
calendario, en libros hechos de corteza de cierto arbol, los cuales eran unas tiras niuy 
largas de quarta 6 tercia en ancho, que se doblaban y recogian, y venia a queder a 
manera de un libro encuardenada en cuartilla, poco mas 6 menos. Estas letras y 
caracteres no las entendian, sino los sacerdotes de los idolos, {jque en aquella lengua se 
llaman ^akkines,^) y algun indio principal. Despues las entendieron y supieron leer 
algunos frailos nuestros y aun las escribien." — (" Relacion Breve y Verdadera de 
Algunas Cosas de las Muchas que Sucedieron al Padre Fray Alonso Ponce, Comis- 
ario-General en las Proviitcias de la Nueva Espana" page 392). I know no other 
author who makes the interesting statement that these characters were actually used by 
the missionaries to impart instruction to the natives ; but I learn through Mr. Gatschet, 
of the Bureau of Ethnology, Washington, that a manuscript written in this manner by 
one of the early padres has recently been discovered. 

\ " Se les quematnos todos," he writes, " lo qual a maravilla sentian y les dava 
pena" — "Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan" page 316. 



some of the more intelligent had learned the Spanish alphabet, and 
the missionaries had added a sufficient number of signs to it to ex- 
press with tolerable accuracy the phonetics of the Maya tongue. 
Relying on their memories, and, no doubt, aided by some manu- 
scripts secretly preserved, many natives set to work to write out in 
this new alphabet the contents of their ancient records. Much was 
added which had been brought in by the Europeans, and much 
omitted which had become unintelligible or obsolete since the Con- 
quest ; while, of course, the different writers, varying in skill and 
knowledge, produced works of very various merit. 

Nevertheless, each of these books bore the same name. In 
whatever village it was written, or by whatever hand, it always was, 
and to-day still is, called " The Book of Chilan Balam." To dis- 
tinguish them apart, the name of the village where a copy was 
found or written, is added. Probably, in the last century, almost 
every village had one, which was treasured with superstitious ven- 
eration. But the opposition of the padres to this kind of literature, 
the decay of ancient sympathies, and especially the long war of 
races, which since 1847 has desolated so much of the peninsula, 
have destroyed most of them. There remain, however, either por- 
tions or descriptions of not less than sixteen of these curious records. 
They are known from the names of the villages respectively as the 
Book of Chilan Balam of Nabula, of Chumayel, of Kaua, of Mani, 
of Oxkutzcab, of Ixil, of Tihosuco, of Tixcocob, etc., these being 
the names of various native towns in the peninsula. 

When I add that not a single one of these has ever been 
printed, or even entirely translated into any European tongue, it 
will be evident to every archaeologist and linguist what a rich and 
unexplored mine of informatioh about this interesting people they 
may present. It is my intention in this article merely to touch 
upon a few salient points to illustrate this, leaving a thorough dis- 
cussion of their origin and contents to the future editor who will 
bring them to the knowledge of the learned world. 

Turning first to the meaning of the name " Chilan Balam" it 
is not difficult to find its derivation. " Chilaii" says Bishop 
Landa, the second bishop of Yucatan, whose description of the 
native customs is an invaluable source to us, " was the name of 
their priests, whose duty it was to teach the sciences, to appoint 
holy days, to treat the sick, to offer sacrifices, and especially to 



utter the oracles of the gods. They were so highly honored by 
the people that usually they were carried on litters on the shoul- 
ders of the devotees," * Strictly speaking, in Maya " chtlan " 
means " interpreter," "mouth-piece," from " chij," "the mouth," 
and in this ordinary sense frequently occurs in other writings. The 
word, " balam'" — literally, "tiger," — was also applied to a class of 
priests, and is still in use among the natives of Yucatan as the 
designation of the protective spirits of fields and towns, as I have 
shown at length in a recent study of the word as it occurs in the 
the native myths of Guatemala.f " Chilan Balam," therefore, is 
not a proper name, but a title, and in ancient times designated the 
priest who announced the will of the gods and explained the 
sacred oracles. This accounts for the universality of the name and 
the sacredness of its associations. 

The dates of the books which have come down to us are vari- 
ous. One of them, " The Book of Chilan Balam of Mani," was 
undoubtedly composed not later than 1595, as is proved by inter- 
nal evidence. Various passages in the works of Landa, Lizana, 
Sanchez Aguilar and Cogolludo — all early historians of Yucatan, — 
prove that many of these native manuscripts existed in the six- 
teenth century. Several rescripts date from the seventeenth cen- 
tury, — most from the latter half of the eighteenth. 

The names of the writers are generally not given, probably be- 
cause the books, as we have them, are all copies of older ma lu- 
scripts, with merely the occasional addition of current items of note 
by the copyist ; as, for instance, a malignant epidemic which pre- 
vailed in the peninsula in 1673 is mentioned as a present occurrence 
by the copyist of " The Book of Chilan Balam of Nabula." 

* " Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan" ^■a.^^ l6o. 

f « The Names of the Gods in the Kiche Myths of Central America." Proceed- 
ings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. XIX,, 1881, The terminal letter in 
both these words — " chilan," " balam" — may be either " « " or " m" the change being 
one of dialect and local pronunciation. I have followed the older authorities in writing 
" Chilan Balam" the modern preferring " Chilam Balam." Senor Eligio Ancona, 
in his recently published " Historia de Yucatan" (Vol. I., page 240, note, Merida, 
1878,) offers the absurd suggestion that the name " balam" was given to the native 
soothsayers by the early missionaries in ridicule, deriving it from the well-known per- 
sonage in the Old Testament. It is surprising that Senor Ancona, writing in Merida, 
had never acquainted himself with the Perez manuscripts, nor with those in the 
possession of Canon Carrillo. Indeed, the most of his treatment of the ancient his- 
tory of his country is disappointingly superficial. 



8 

I come now to the contents of these curious works. What they 
contain may conveniently be classified under four headings : 

Astrological and prophetic matters; 

Ancient chronology and history; 

Medical recipes and directions ; 

Later history and Christian teachings. 

The last-mentioned consist of translations of the " Doctrina" 
Bible stories, narratives of events after the Conquest, etc., which I 
shall dismiss as of least interest. 

The astrology appears partly to be reminiscences of that of their 
ancient heathendom, partly that borrowed from the European al- 
manacs of the century 1550-1650. These, as is well known, were 
crammed with predictions and divinations. A careful analysis, 
based on a comparison with the Spanish almanacs of that time 
would doubtless reveal how much was taken from them, and it 
would be fair to presume that the remainder was a survival of an- 
cient native theories. 

But there are not wanting actual prophecies of a much more 
striking character. These were attributed to the ancient priests 
and to a date long preceding the advent of Christianity. Some of 
them have been printed in translations in the " Historias " of Lizana 
and Cogolludo, and of some the originals were published by the 
late Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, in the second volume of the 
reports of the " Mission Scientifiquc au Mexique et dans V Ameriqiie 
Centrale" Their authenticity has been met with considerable 
skepticism by Waitz and others, particularly as they seem to pre- 
dict the arrival of the Christians from the East and the introduc- 
tion of the worship of the cross. 

It appears to me that this incredulity is uncalled for. It is known 
that at the close of each of their larger divisions of time (the so-called 
^' katuns,'') a *' chilan,'^ or inspired diviner, uttered a prediction of 
the character of the year or epoch which was about to begin. Like 
other would-be prophets, he had doubtless learned that it is wiser 
to predict evil than good, inasmuch as the probabilities of evil in 
this worried world of ours outweigh those of good ; and when the 
evil comes his words are remembered to his credit, while, if, per- 
chance, his gloomy forecasts are not realized, no one will bear him a 
grudge that he has been at fault. The temper of this people was, 
moreover, gloomy, and it suited them to hear of threatened danger 



9 

and destruction by foreign foes. But, alas! for them. The worst 
that the boding words of the oracle foretold was as nothing to the 
dire event which overtook them, — the destruction of their nation, 
their temples and their freedom, 'neath the iron heel of the Span- 
ish conqueror. As the wise Goethe says : 

" Seltsam ist Prophetenlied, 
Dock mehr seltsam was geschieht." 

As to the supposed reference to the cross and its worship, it may 
be remarked that the native word translated " cross," by the mis- 
sionaries, simply means " a piece of wood set upright," and may 
well have had a different and special signification in the old days. 
By way of a specimen of these prophecies, I quote one from 
" The Book of Chilan Balam of Chumayel," saying at once that 
for the translation I have depended upon a comparison of the Span- 
ish version of Lizana, who was blindly prejudiced, and that in 
French of the Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, who knew next to 
nothing about Maya, with the original. It will be easily under- 
stood, therefore, that it is rather a paraphrase than a literal render- 
ing. The original is in short, aphoristic sentences, and was, no 
doubt, chanted with a rude rhythm : 

" What time the sun shall brightest shine, 
Tearful will be the eyes of the king. 
Four ages yet shall be inscribed, 
Then shall come the holy priest, the holy god. 
With grief I speak what now I see. 
Watch well the road, ye dwellers in Itza. 
The master of the earth shall come to us. 
Thus prophesies Nahau Pech, the seer. 
In the days of the fourth age, 
At the time of its beginning." 

Such are the obscure and ominous words of the ancient oracle. 
If the date is authentic, it would be about 1480 — the " fourth age " in 
the Maya system of computing time being a period of either twenty 
or twenty-four years at the close of the fifteenth century. 

It is, however, of little importance whether these are accurate 
copies of the ancient prophecies ; they remain, at least, faithful 
imitations of them, composed in the same spirit and form which the 
native priests were wont to employ. A number are given much 
longer than the above, and containing various curious references to 
ancient usages. 



10 

Another value they have in common with all the rest of the text 
of these books, and it is one which will be properly appreciated by 
any student of languages. They are, by common consent of all 
competent authorities, the genuine productions of native minds, 
cast in the idiomatic forms of the native tongue by those born to 
its use. No matter how fluent a foreigner becomes in a language 
not his own, he can never use it as does one who has been familiar 
with it from childhood. This general maxim is ten-fold true when we 
apply it to a European learning an American language. The flow of 
thought, as exhibited in these two linguistic families, is in such 
different directions that no amount of practice can render one equally 
accurate in both. Hence the importance of studying a tongue as 
it is employed by natives ; and hence the very high estimate I place 
on these "Books of Chilan Balam " as linguistic material, — an esti- 
mate much increased by the great rarity of independent composi- 
tions in their own tongues by members of the native races of this 
continent. 

I now approach what I consider the peculiar value of these re- 
cords, apart from the linguistic mould in which they are cast ; and 
that is the light they throw upon the chronological system and 
ancient history of the Mayas. To a limited extent, this has already 
been brought before the public. The late Don Pio Perez gave to 
Mr. Stephens, when in Yucatan, an essay on the method of com- 
puting time among the ancient Mayas, and also a brief synopsis of 
Maya history, apparently going back to the third or fourth century 
of the Christian era. Both were published by Mr. Stephens in the 
appendix to his " Travels in Yucatan," and have appeared re- 
peatedly since in English, Spanish and French.* They have, up 
to the present, constituted almost our sole sources of information 
on these interesting points. Don Pio Perez was rather vague as 
to whence he derived his knowledge. He refers to " ancient manu- 
scripts," " old authorities," and the like ; but, as the Abbe Bras- 
seur de Bourbourg justly complains, he rarely quotes their words, 

* For example, in the " Registro Yucateco," Tome III. ; " Diccionario Universal 
de Ilistoria y Geografia" Totne VIIT. (Mexico, 1855); "Diccionario Historico dc 
Yucataji" Tome I. (Merida, 1866) ; in the appendix to Landa's " Cosas de Yucatan " 
(Paris, 1864), etc. The epochs, or katitns, of Maya history have been recently again 
analyzed by Dr. Felipe Valentini, in an essay in the German and English langu.ages, 
the latter in the " Proceedings of tlie American Antiquarian Society, 1880." 



It 

and gives no descriptions as to what they were or how he gained 
access to them.* In fact, the whole of Senor Perez's information 
was derived from these " Books of Chilan Balam ; " and, without 
wishing at all to detract from his reputation as an antiquary and a 
Maya scholar, I am obliged to say that he has dealt with them as 
scholars so often do with their authorities ; that is, having framed 
his theories, he quoted what he found in their favor and neglected 
to refer to what he observed was against them. 

Thus, it is a cardinal question in Yucatecan archaeology as to 
whether the epoch or age by which the great cycle (the ahau 
katun,) was reckoned, embraced twenty or twenty-four years. 
Contrary to all the Spanish authorities, Perez declared for twenty- 
four years, supporting himself by " the manuscripts." It is true 
there are three of the " Books of Chilan Balam " — those of Mani, 
Kaua and Oxkutzcab, — which are distinctly in favor of twenty- 
four years ; but, on the other hand, there are four or five others 
which are clearly for the period of twenty years, and of these Don 
Perez said nothing, although copies of more than one of them were 
in his library. So of the epochs, or katuns, of Maya histor}^ ; there 
are three or more copies in these books which he does not seem to 
have compared with the one he furnished Stephens. His labor 
will have to be repeated according to the methods of modern criti- 
cism, and with the additional material obtained since he wrote. 

Another valuable feature in these records is the hints they fur- 
nish of the hieroglyphic system of the Mayas. Almost our only 
authority heretofore has been the essay of Landa. It has suffered 
somewhat in credit because we had no means of verifying his state- 
ments and comparing the characters he gives. Dr. Valentini has 
even gone so far as to attack some of his assertions as "fabrications." 
This is an amount .of skepticism which exceeds both justice and 
probability. 

The chronological portions of the " Books of Chilan Balam " 
re partly written with the ancient signs of the days, months and 
epochs, and they furnish us, also, delineations of the " wheels " which 
the natives used for computing time. The former are so important 
to the student of Maya hieroglyphics, that I have added photographic 
reproductions of them to this paper, giving also representations of 

* The Abbe's criticism occurs in the note to page 406 of his edition of Landa's 
" Cosas de Yucatan." 



12 




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Cuvn/^U 2/Jct 
Tiio. -u. Zh.ya. 



SIGNS OF THE MONTHS, FROM THE BOOK OF ClULAN BALAM OF CHUMAYEL. 



13 



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OctaLre 2.^ 

Novie7nj[>re 13 





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Mayo II 

R/LYAB 

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SIGNS OF THE MONTHS, AS GIVEN BY BISHOP LANDA. 



14 

those of Landa for comparison. It will be observed that the signs 
of the days are distinctly similar in the majority of cases, but that 
those of the months are hardly alike. 

The hieroglyphs of the days taken from the " Codex Troano" 
an ancient Maya book written before the Conquest, probably about 
1400, are also added to illustrate the variations which occurred in 
the hands of different scribes. Those from the " Books of Chilan 
Balam " are copied from a manuscript known to Maya scholars as 
the " Codice Perez" of undoubted authenticity and antiquity.* 

The result of the comparison I thus institute is a triumphant 
refutation of the doubts and slurs which have been cast on Bishop 
Landa's work and vindicate for it a very high degree of accuracy. 

The hieroglyphics for the months are quite complicated, and in 
the " Books of Chilan Balam " are rudely drawn ; but, for all that, 
two or three of them are evidently identical with those in the cal- 
endar preserved by Landa. Some years ago, Professor de Rosny 
expressed himself in great doubt as to the fidelity in the tracing of 
these hierogylphs of the months, principally because he could not 
find them in the two codices at his command.^ As he observes, 
they are composite signs, and this goes to explain the discrepancy ; 
for it may be regarded as established that the Maya script permitted 
the use of several signs for the same sound, and the sculptor or 
scribe was not obliged to represent the same word always by the 
same figure. 

In close relation to chronology is the system of numeration and 
the arithmetical signs. These are discussed with considerable ful- 
ness, especially in the " Book of Chilan Balam of Kaua." The 
numerals are represented by exactly the same figures as we find in 
the Maya manuscripts of the libraries of Dresden, Pesth, Paris and 
Madrid ; that is, by points or dots up to five, and the fives by single 
straight lines, which may be indiscriminately drawn vertically or 
horizontally. The same book contains a table of multiplication in 

* It is described at length by Don Crescencio Carrillo y Ancona, in his •• Diserta- 
cion sobre la Historia de la Lengiia Maya" (Merida, 1870). 

j " Je dots declarer que Vexamen dans tous leurs details du ' Codex Troano ' et du 
' Codex Peresianus ' m' invite de lafa^on la plus serieuse d n^ accepter ces signes, tout 
au moins ati point de vue de V exactitude de leur trace, qu'avec une certaine reserved — 
Leon de Rosny's " Essai sur le Dechiffrement de PEcriture Hicratique de PAmcrique 
Centrale," page 21 (Paris, 1876). By the " Codex Peresianus ," he does not mean the 
" Codice Perez," but the Maya manuscript in the Bibliotheque Nationale. The iden- 
tity uf the names is confusing and unfortunate. 



15 

Spanish and Maya which settles some disputed points in the use of 
the vigesimal system by the Mayas. 

A curious chapter in several of the books, especially those of 
Kaua and Mani, is that on the thirteen ahau katiins, or epochs of 
the greater cycle of the Mayas. This cycle embraced thirteen 
periods, which, as I have before remarked, are computed by some 
at twenty years each, by others at twenty-four years each. Each 
of these katuns was presided over by a chief or king, that being the 
meaning of the word ahaii. The books above-mentioned give both 
the name and the portrait, drawn and colored by the rude hand of 
the native artist, of each of these kings, and they suggest several 
interesting analogies. 

They are, in the first place, identical, with one exception, with 
those on an ancient native painting, an engraving of which is given 
by Father Cogolludo in his " History of Yucatan," and explained by 
him as the representation of an occurrence which took place after 
the Spaniards arrived in the peninsula. Evidently, the native in 
whose hands the worthy father found it, fearing that he partook of 
the fanaticism which had led the missionaries to the destruction of 
so many records of the nation, deceived him as to its purport, and 
gave him an explanation which imported to the scroll the character 
of a harmless history. 

The one exception is the last or thirteenth chief. Cogolludo 
appends to this the name of an Indian who probably did fall a vic- 
tim to his friendship to the Spaniards. This name, as a sort of 
guarantee for the rest of his story, the native scribe inserted in 
place of the genuine one. The peculiarity of the figure is that it 
has an arrow or dagger driven into its eye. Not only is this men- 
tioned by Cogolludo's informant, but it is represented in the paint- 
ings in both the " Books of Chilan Balam " above noted, and also, 
by a fortunate coincidence, in one of the calendar-pages of the ''Co- 
dex Troano" plate xxiii., in a remarkable cartouche, which, from a 
wholly independent course of reasoning, was some time since identi- 
fied by my esteemed correspondent, Professor Cyrus Thomas, of 
Illinois, as a cartouche of one of the ahaii katuns, and probably of 
the last of them. It gives me much pleasure to add such conclu- 
sive proof of the sagacity of his supposition.* 

* « The Manuscript Troano," published in The American Naturalist, Ku^xysX, 1881, 
page 640. This manuscript or codex was published in chromo-lithograph, Paris, 1879, 
by the French Government. 



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There is other evidence to show that the engraving in Cogol- 
ludo is a relic of the purest ancient Maya symbolism, — one of 
the most interesting which have been preserved to us; but to 
enter upon its explanation in this connection would be too far 
from my present topic. 

A favorite theme with the writers of the " Books of Chilan 
Balam " was the cure of diseases. Bishop Landa explains the 
" chilanes " as " sorcerers and doctors," and adds that one of their 
prominent duties was to diagnose diseases and point out their ap- 
propriate remedies.* As we might expect, therefore, considerable 
prominence is given to the description of symptoms and suggestions 
for their alleviation. Bleeding and the administration of prepara- 
tions of native plants are the usual prescriptions ; but there are 
others which have probably been borrowed from some domestic 
medicine-book of European origin. 

The late Don Pio Perez gave a great deal of attention to col- 
lecting these native recipes, and his manuscripts were carefully ex- 
amined by Dr. Berendt, who combined all the necessary knowledge, 
botanical, linguistic and medical, and who has left a large manu- 
script, entitled "Recefarios de Indios," which presents the subject 
fully. He considers the scientific value of these remedies to be 
next to nothing, and the language in which they are recorded to be 
distinctly inferior to that of the remainder of the " Books of Chilan 
Balam." Hence, he believes that this portion of the ancient 
records was supplanted some time in the last century by medical 
notions introduced from European sources. Such, in fact, is the state- 
ment of the copyists of the books themselves, as these recipes, etc., 
are sometimes found in a separate volume, entitled " The Book of 
the Jew," — '' ElLibro deljudioy Who this alleged Jewish phys- 
ician was, who left so wide-spread and durable a renown among the 
Yucatecan natives, none of the archaeologists has been able to 

find out.f 

The language and style of most of these books are aphoristic. 



* «' Declarar las necesidades y sus remedios." — " Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan" 
page i6o. Like much of Landa's Spanish, this use of the word " necesidad" is collo- 
quial, and not classical. 

\ A "Medicina Domestical' under the name of " Don Ricardo Ossado, (alias, el 
Judio,)" was published at Merida in 1834 ; but this appears to have been merely a 
bookseller's device to aid the sale of the book by attributing it to the " great unknown." 



19 

elliptical and obscure. The Maya language has naturally under- 
gone considerable alteration since they were written ; therefore, even 
to competent readers of ordinary Maya, they are not readily 
understood. Fortunately, however, there are in existence excellent 
dictionaries of the Maya of the sixteenth and seventeenth centu- 
ries, which, were they published, would be sufficient for this purpose. 
A few persons in Yucatan have appreciated the desirability of 
collecting and preserving these works. Don Pio Perez was the 
first to do so, and of living Yucatecan scholars particular mention 
should be made of the Rev. Canon Don Crescencio Carrillo y An 
cona, who has written a good, and I believe the only, description of 
them which has yet appeared in print.* They attracted the ear- 
nest attention of that eminent naturalist and ethnologist, the late 
Dr. C. Hermann Berendt, and at a great expenditure of time and 
labor he visited various parts of Yucatan, and with remarkable skill 
made facsimile copies of the most important and complete speci- 
mens which he could anywhere find. This invaluable and unique 
collection has come into my hands since his death, and it is this which 
has prompted me to make known their character and contents to 
those interested in such subjects. 

* In his "Disertacionsobre laHistoriade la Lengua Maya 6 Yucateca" (Merida, 
1870). 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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015 843 410 6 •, 




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